"Angel, it's your baby too. Besides, it's a power shower... not a baby shower." Buffy replied.

"What's the difference?"

"Well, Cordelia read that the term 'baby shower' frightens men, so if you want to have a shower with men there as well, you should call it a 'power shower'." Buffy explained.

Angel gave her a strange look. "You're kidding."

"Nope." Buffy smiled, shaking her head as the approached the front door.

"Hi you two!" Joyce grinned, snapping their picture like crazy.

"Mom, please not today... I need to be able to see."

Joyce rolled her eyes. "Angel, how do you put up with her? She's so melodramatic."

"Yeah, but she's pretty cute." Angel chuckled.

Buffy shot him a mock dirty look before turning to her mother. "What do you need me to do?"

"Nothing! It's *your* party! Just go sit down. Are you hungry?"

Buffy shook her head. "I feel *so* fat. I'm sick of being pregnant. I want to have this kid already!"

"Two more weeks, Baby." Angel reminded her, trying to give her some comfort.

Buffy glared at him. "Two more weeks! What, is that nothing to you? Well imagine *fourteen* days of craving things any time of the day or night and if you don't have it you can't focus on anything else! Imagine your ankles and feet hurt because they're swollen! Imagine when you keep getting horrible cramps in your legs. Imagine being twenty-five pounds overweight! That's not a lot to some people, but that was over a fourth of what I weighed before. I'm *tired* of this!"

Angel sighed; he felt bad for her, he really did. It was obvious to him that she was rarely comfortable. Add to that all the stress she was dealing with in school and it just did not bode well for being in a good mood all the time. But that didn't mean he had to like it. It was going to be a *long* day.

Angel walked heavy with dread to the living room. He and Buffy had been at Joyce and Giles' for half an hour and everyone else was due to arrive at the shower soon. He and Giles had tried to plan an escape, but Joyce had caught them and properly guilted them by reminding them how much Buffy wanted them there and would be broken-hearted if they left.

Willow had arrived ten minutes earlier and she and Buffy had been sitting in the living room, talking. Buffy appeared to be quite happy to see her old friend after all these months, which made Angel happy. Unfortunately, Willow had to go right back to school the next day, but at least she and Buffy had been able to spend a little bit of time together.

"You want me to look the recipe up for you later?" Angel heard Willow ask as he walked into the room.

"Sure! You can give it to me when we go to lunch tomorrow." Buffy replied.

"Recipe for what?" Angel asked, having hope he'd want to eat it. Most of what sounded good to Buffy these days disgusted him, but if there was an actual recipe, it might be good.

"Willow saw a recipe on the Internet for a labor inducing salad." Buffy informed him with a grin. "I am so sick of being pregnant."

Angel opened his mouth to read her the riot act, after all as much as she hated the idea of being pregnant for two more weeks, if the baby wasn't ready to be born she shouldn't force it, but then saw the ridiculousness of it. A *salad* inducing labor? Ridiculous.

"Don't worry, I made Buffy promise she can't eat it until December 13^th... which would make her one day overdue." Willow added.

Buffy sighed. "She did."

"Well, that's good. I want to keep you all to myself as long as I can." Angel teased, sitting down beside Buffy and kissing her on the cheek. "Once the baby gets here you won't have time for me." He pretended to pout.

Buffy rolled her eyes. "Oh please."

The doorbell rang and Willow quickly stood up. "That should be Oz... it better be because he has your gift!"

As the redhead rushed from the room to go answer the door, Angel used the opportunity to nibble on Buffy's ear.

"Could you two knock it off... it's just nasty!" Xander complained as he walked into the room, followed by Oz and Willow.

"Hey Xander." Buffy replied, ignoring his remarks.

"Hi Buff." He said as he placed her gift down on a table and bent to give her a kiss on the cheek. "You know... I think you might actually be bigger than you were two days ago!"

"Cute." She remarked, smacking him on the arm.

Xander sighed. "Do we have to wait for everyone else to get here? I'm starving."

"Calm down, they'll be here soon." Willow told him as Oz set their presents to Buffy beside Xander's and sat in the recliner.

"Hi Buffy, Angel." Oz said quietly as Willow sat in his lap.

"Hi Oz." Buffy smiled as Angel nodded.

"Who's coming anyway?" Xander asked.

"Well, Cordelia, of course. Amy said she'd be here... and that's about it. I wanted to keep it small."

"And why are *we* here?" Xander questioned. "As in us guys."

"Because you're my friends!" Buffy argued.

"We'll look like sissies. Guys don't go to baby showers."

"It's not a baby shower, it's a power shower." Angel repeated what Buffy had told him before.

Xander shook his head. "You are so whipped!"

Rolling his eyes, Angel decided to change the subject. "How is school going, Willow?"

"Oh, really well." She smiled. "Of course, I miss you all you guys so much. I mean, I have a lot of new friends, but they just can't compare to the Scooby Gang."

"I'm actually planning on moving up to San Bruno next month." Oz announced. "We got a gig in San Francisco so I can live half an hour from there and half an hour from Will."

Willow smiled happily. "Yeah, and we decided last night that after this next semester when it's not required I live on campus we can get an apartment together."

"That's great, Will!" Buffy grinned.

"What does your mom say about you two 'shacking up'?" Xander asked, knowing very well that Sheila Rosenberg would *so* not approve.

"Shut up, Xander." The four other occupants of the room replied in unison.

"It's time for the games!" Joyce announced.

Buffy felt a bit worried. She remembered and dreaded the 'guess the girth' game. Joyce had heard from her daughter many times how much she hated the idea of pulling toilet paper off a roll to guess how big around the belly the expectant mother was.

Instead, Joyce pulled out two dolls in cloth diapers, as well as wipes and baby powder. "We're having a little relay race. Everyone makes two lines over here, the first person takes the 'baby' over to the table," she instructed, pointing to a table about fifteen feet away. "And diaper the baby properly, then race it back to your teammate so that can do the same thing."

After Joyce had explained in detail just how to change a diaper, she picked the teams. "How about on Willow, Oz and Amy on one team and Xander, Cordelia and Angel on the other."

"Wait... *I* have to participate?" Angel asked.

"Of course!" Joyce replied.

"But... Buffy doesn't have to, why do I?"

"Because I'm eight months pregnant, Angel. I *can't*." Buffy told her husband. "Besides, we need you to even out the teams."

"Why can't Giles?"

"I have to film to events and watch the baby." Giles explained, smirking at his son-in-law from behind the video camera.

Buffy patted his knee. "Win it for me, Baby!"

Sighing, Angel stood and got in line behind Xander and Cordelia. Joyce blew the whistle and Willow and Xander took off, quickly changing the dolls. However, Willow simply raced the doll back and handed it to Oz, who quickly ran to the table to follow suit, whereas Xander brought the doll back to Cordelia and she began yelling at him for putting the diaper on backwards. The former couple continued to bicker as Oz finished changing the doll and brought it to Amy. Once she was done and Xander and Cordelia were still arguing, Angel sighed and sat back down next to Buffy.

"Well.. that was fun." Joyce sighed once she'd snatched the doll from Xander and they'd given up on who was right or wrong, instead just sitting down with everyone else. "Let's try one more game!" She smiled, pulling out a toilet paper roll.

"Now *this* I can win!" Xander grinned.

Buffy shot her mother a scornful look. How could she do this to her? It was downright degrading.

Handing the roll to Willow, Joyce explained. "Everyone take a strip off the paper off the roll... We'll let Angel sit out of this one."

Willow laughed and pulled off a strip that was as tall as she was, while Oz pulled off a small piece, probably two feet tall. He never liked the idea of the game either. Everyone else pulled off ridiculously long strips of paper.

When they were all done, Joyce smiled. "Okay, Buffy hold out your foot."

"Huh?" Buffy asked.

"We need your foot to see who got closest to the actual circumference." Joyce explained.

"Hey, that's cheating!" Xander whined.

Cordelia smacked him upside the head. "She never said it was supposed to be her waistline, we just assumed it. How did you guess the truth, Oz?"

The musician shrugged. "I was just trying to be nice to Buffy."

At last, it was time to open gifts, which was apparently the part that the girls most looked forward to, Angel observed. The first gift Buffy opened was from Willow and Oz.

They had gotten the baby quite a few children's books. There were some classics like 'Goodnight Moon', but most were written by Dr. Suess.

"I know you told me you loved how your father read you his books when you were little, so I thought you'd like that for your own baby." Willow explained as Buffy hugged her tightly.

"Oh, it's so perfect! Thanks you two!" Buffy replied, trying not to cry. Damn hormones.

"Ready for my gift?" Xander asked eagerly. "I had it made special for you!"

Buffy unwrapped his gift and found a little white T-shirt.

With the words 'My Daddy loves to brood' on it.

"Xander!" Buffy said, trying to sound stern and not to laugh. He had a point.

"Hey! I don't brood anymore!" Angel defended himself.

"That was rude." Cordelia commented to her ex-boyfriend as she popped a tortilla chip in her mouth.

Xander shrugged. "But funny."

Buffy shook her head in admonishment before moving onto Amy's gift. It was a small satchel with various herbs inside it.

"Hang it by the window in the baby's room. I blessed it, so it will bring protection." Amy explained.

"Thank you." Buffy smiled. Even if the Hellmouth was closed, one couldn't be too careful.

Cordelia got a beautiful quilt that would match the nursery's decoration as well as some more unisex outfits, telling Buffy that she didn't want the poor child to suffer in case Buffy had been having an off day when she bought all the other clothes. Bad fashion was cruel to a child, as far as she was concerned.

Joyce and Giles got Buffy a bouncy seat she'd been admiring at the store. It would be able to hold the baby when Buffy had chores to do. It even had a bar across the front with little toys on it to keep the baby entertained when he or she got older.

Last, there was a gift from Hank that he'd left with Joyce during his visit two days earlier. It was a little activity gym with a cloth mat and toys suspended by arched bars over it. Buffy smiled, not only had her dad actually thought of her, he'd gotten a great gift for the baby.

After everyone had eaten cake, they started departing, heading off to jobs or Saturday night dates. It was still in the middle of the afternoon, so Willow and Oz were going to go be alone for a while, but come to Buffy and Angel's later for pizza and videos.

Angel and Giles loaded all the gifts into Angel's car while Buffy helped Joyce clean up. Once he and his father-in-law were done, Angel headed into the house to see if Buffy was ready to go.

He found his wife staring dreamily out the kitchen window. Angel came up behind her, wrapping his arms around Buffy and gently rubbing her belly.

"What are you thinking about?" He asked.

Buffy smiled and leaned her head back against his shoulder. "Just how amazing this is. We're having a *baby*! A person made from you and me... because we love each other so much. Sometimes it's just... wow."

"Let's go home." Angel murmured, kissing his wife on the side of her neck. "We can have some fun before Willow and Oz come over."

Buffy laughed. "Is that all you ever think about?"

"Well... if you don't want to..." Angel teased.

"I wouldn't go that far." Buffy giggled, turning her head so she could kiss her husband more passionately.

And for a moment, all was right. Their lives were completely peaceful, and they were content.

Which of course meant total chaos was right around the corner.

The End

<< back